SGP Technologies claims that the Blackphone is the "world's first privacy-optimized smartphone"

We first brought you word of the Android-based Blackphone back in mid-January, and this week the smartphone is finally shipping to consumers. The Blackphone is the brainchild of SGP Technologies — a joint venture between Silent Circle and Geeksphone — and uses a customized version of Android 4.4 KitKat, which it calls PrivatOS.

SGP says that the Blackphone is “built from the ground up to maximize user privacy” and includes such features as private/encrypted cloud storage, encrypted voice/video calls and text messaging, Wi-Fi security settings which prevent hotspots from gleaning connection history and patterns of activity, remote wipe, and private web browsing.

"Blackphone's arrival puts mobile privacy directly in the hands of professionals and consumers everywhere,” said SGP Technologies CEO Toby Weir-Jones. In a world where devices and apps increasingly offer features only in return for users' personal or sensitive information, the pent-up demand for Blackphone shows there is strong, international demand for our brand's devices and services that stand apart by placing privacy before all else."